McGill University sits on Tiohtiá:ke, land that has long served as a site of meeting and exchange among Indigenous peoples, notably the Anishinabeg and Kanien'kehá:ka nations — the latter one of the six nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. The McGill Youth Advisory Delegation (MYAD) to the United Nations acknowledges the damage and deprivation of settler colonialism—not only territorial dispossession but the erasure of Indigenous culture, exclusion of Indigenous voices from politics and policymaking, intergenerational trauma, and further injustices, which are ongoing. 

As youth who engage in policy work, we understand Indigenous history as directly relevant to our mission. Indigenous self-determination, sovereignty, and governance must be acknowledged. We commit to examining the biases and structural barriers within ourselves and the institutions we operate in that continue to hurt Indigenous Peoples, and to carry that awareness into how MYAD engages with policy, advocacy, and leadership. We encourage all stakeholders that we interact with to consider their own position and privilege, both within Tiohtiá:ke/Montreal and in the broader systems they work within.

To learn more about whose land you reside on, visit native-land.ca. If you have questions about this acknowledgement or would like additional resources, please reach out to localcomms@irsam.ca.